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TRIBUTE TO JOSIAH QUINCY 



BY THE 



assac^usttts pisl0rital ^^tni'g. 



TRIBUTE 



MASSACHUSETTS HISTOEICAL SOCIETY 



®a tfje ilHnnovg 



J O S I A H Q U I N C Y, 



July 14, 18C4. 



r 



^ 




BOSTON: (?^ 
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 
1864. 






BOSTON: 
ntlNTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, 

15, Water Street. 



T R I B U T E. 



At the Stated Meeting of the Massachusetts Histo- 
rical Society, held at their Rooms, on Tremont Street, 
Thursday, July 14, 1864, after some preliminary busi- 
ness, the President, the Hon. Robert C. Winthrop, 
spoke as follows : — 

Gentlemen of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 

When we were last assembled here, at our stated monthly 
meeting, on tlie ninth day of June, our Society, for the first 
time since its institution in 1791, had on its catalogue just 
a hundred names of living members, resident within the 
Commonwealth of Massachusetts. An election at the previous 
meeting in May had at length completed the full number 
allowed by our charter ] and on that day our roll was full. 

At the head of that roll — first in the order of seniority, 
and second, certainly, in nothing that could attract interest, 
respect, and veneration — stood the name of one who had 
been a member of the Society during sixty-eight out of the 
seventy years of our corporate existence ; who had wit- 
nessed our small beginnings ; who had been associated with 
Belknap and Sullivan and Tudor and Minot, and the rest 
of the little band of our immediate founders, in all but our 
verj' earliest proceedings and publications ; who for seventeen 
years, long past, had been our Treasurer, and had repeatedly 
done faithful and valuable service as a member of our Execu- 



4 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

live and of our Publishing Committees ; whose interest in our 
prosperity and welfare had known no suspension or abate- 
ment with the lapse of time ; who had contributed liberally to 
the means by which our condition had of late been so largely 
improved, and our accommodations so widely extended; and 
who so often, during the very last years of his eventful and 
protracted life, had lent the highest interest to our meetings 
by his venerable presence, and by his earnest and impressive 
participation in our discussions and doings. 

You all remember, I am sure, how proudly he marshalled 
the way for us into this beautiful Dowse Library, when its 
folding-doors were first thrown open seven or eight j^ears ago, 
and when it might so Avell have been said of him, — 

" The monumental pomp of age 
Was with this goodly personage; 
A stature undepressed in size, 
Unbent, which rather seemed to rise, 
In open victory o'er the weight 
Of eighty j'cars, to loftier height." 

You all remember how impressively he reminded us, not 
long afterwards, at that memorable meeting on the death of 
our lamented Prescott, that he became a member of this 
Society the very year in which that illustrious historian was 
born. 

You all remember how playfully he observed, a few years 
later, when seconding the nomination of the late Lord Lynd- 
hurst as one of our Honorary Members, that the same nurse 
had served in immediate succession for the infant Copley and 
himself, and that she must certainly have given them both 
something very good to make them live so long. 

You all remember how pleasantly he recalled to us that 
earliest reminiscence of his own infancy, when, being taken 
by his widowed mother out of Boston, while it was in the 
joint possession of the British army and of a pestilence even 
more formidable than any army, he was stopped at the lines 



JOSIAH QUINCY. O 

to be smoked, for fear he might communicate contagion to the 
American troops who were besieging the town. 

You have not forgotten that delightful meeting beneath his 
own hospitable roof, on the eighty-third anniversary of the 
battle of Lexington, — the guns of which might have startled 
his own infant slumbers, — when he read to us so many inter- 
esting memoranda, from the manuscript diaries of his patriot 
father, in regard to events which led to the establishment of 
our National Independence. 

Still less can any of you have forgotten his personal attend- 
ance here only a few months since, when, with an evident 
consciousness that he had come among us for the last time, he 
presented to us several most interesting and valuable histori- 
cal documents — at this moment passing through the press — 
which he had recently observed among his private papers ; 
which he thought might possibly have come into his possession 
as one of our Publishing Committee more than half a century 
ago ; and which, with the scrupulous exactness which charac- 
terized him through life, he desired to deliver up to us per- 
sonally, before it should be too late for him to do so. 

No wonder, my friends, that we always welcomed his pres- 
ence here with such eager interest. No wonder that with so 
much pleasure we saw him seated, from time to time, in 
yonder Washington chair, hitherto reserved for him alone ; 
for he alone of our number had ever personally seen and 
known that " foremost man of all this world." No wonder that 
we cherished his name with so much pride at the head of our 
roll, as an historical name, linking us, by its associations with 
the living as well as with the dead, to the heroic period of our 
Revolutionary struggle ; and no wonder, certainly, that we all 
feel deeply to-day, when we are assembled to receive the 
official announcement of his death, that a void has been 
created in our ranks and in our hearts, which can hardly be 
filled. 



6 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

I have spoken of his name as an historical name ; and I 
need hardly say, that it would have been so, even had it been 
associated with no other career than his own. His own for- 
tunate and remarkable life, — embracing the whole period of 
our existence thus far as a nation, and covering more than a 
third of the time since the earliest colonial settlement of New 
England, — a life crowded with the most varied and valuable 
public service, and crowned at last with such a measure of 
honor, love, and reverence, as rarely falls to the lot of humani- 
ty, — was sufficient in itself to secure for him an historical 
celebrity, even while he still lived. But, indeed, his name 
had entered into history while he was yet an unconscious 
child. In a letter of the Rev. Dr. William Gordon's, dated on 
the 26th of April, 1775, and contained in his contemporaneous 
''History of the Rise, Progress, and Establishment of the Inde- 
pendence of America," will be found the following passage : — 

"My friend Quincy has sacrificed his life for the sake of his coun- 
try. The ship in which he sailed arrived at Cape Ann within these 
two days ; but he lived not to get on shore, or to hear and triumph at 
the account of the success of the Lexin":ton engageraent. His remains 
Avill be honorably interred by his relations. Let him be numbered 
with the patriotic heroes who fall in the cause of Liberty, and let his 
memory be dear to posterity. Let his only surviving child, a son of 
about three years, live to possess his nolle virtues, and to transmit Jiis 
•name cloivn to future cjenerations." 

Nor can we fail to recall, in this connection, those most 
remarkable words in the last will and testament of that 
patriot father, whose career was as brilliant as it was brief, 
and whose premature death was among the severest losses of 
our early Revolutionary period : — 

" I give to my son, when he shall arrive to tlie age of fifteen 
years, Algernon Sidney's Works, John Locke's Works, Lord Bacon's 
Works, C4ordon's Tacitus, and Cato's Letters. May the spirit of 
Liberty rest upon him ! " 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 7 

Such was the introduction to history of him whose life is 
just closed. Such were the utterances in regard to hira while 
he was yet but of infant years. How rarely is it vouchsafed 
to any one to fulfil such hopes and expectations ! Yet, now 
that he has left us at almost a patriarch's age, these words seem 
to have been prophetic of the career which awaited him ; and 
we could hardly find a juster or a more enviable inscription 
for his monument than to say that " he lived to possess the 
.noble virtues of his father, and to transmit his name down to 
future generations," and that '' the spirit of Liberty rested 
upon him." 

It is not for me, however, gentlemen, to attempt even a 
sketch of the career or character of our departed associate 
and friend. I have indeed been permitted to know him for 
many years past, as intimately, perhaps, as the difference of 
our ages would allow. As I attended his remains a few days 
since as one of the pall-bearers, — a distinction which was 
assigned me as your President, — I could not forget how often 
at least forty years before, when he was the next-door neigh- 
bor of my father's family, I had walked along with him, hand 
in hand, of a summer or a winter morning, — he on his way to 
the City Hall as the honored Mayor of Boston ; and I, as a boy, 
to the Public Latin School just opposite. From that time to 
this I have enjoyed his acquaintance and his friendship, and 
have counted them among the cherished privileges of my life. 
But there are those of our number, and some of them present 
with us to-day, who have been associated with him, as I have 
never been, in more than one of his varied public emplo}'- 
ments, and who can bear personal testimony to the fidelity 
and ability with which he discharged them. 

We may look in vain, it is true, for any of the personal 
associates of his early career as a statesman. He had out- 
lived almost all the contemporaries of his long and brilliant 
service in our State and National Legislatures. But asso- 



8 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

ciates and witnesses are still left of liis vigorous and most 
successful administration of our municipal affairs, and of his 
faithful and devoted labors for sixteen years as President of 
our beloved University. Meantime, the evidences of his lite- 
rary and intellectual accomplishments are familiar to us all, in 
his History of the University, in his History of the Athenaeum, 
in his Municipal History of Boston, in his Biographies of his 
ever-honored father, and of his illustrious friend and kinsman, 
John Quincy Adams, and in so many speeches, addresses, and 
essays, upon almost every variety of topic, historical, political, 
literary, social, and moral. 

We may follow him back, indeed, to the day when he was 
graduated with the highest honors at the University of which 
he lived to be the oldest alumnus ; and we shall never find 
him idle or unemployed, nor ever fail to trace him by some 
earnest word or some energetic act. Everywhere we shall 
see him a man of untiring industry, of spotless integrity, of 
practical ability and sagacity, of the boldest independence and 
sturdiest self-reliance ; a man of laborious investigation as 
well as of prompt action, with a ready pen and an eloquent 
tongue for defending and advocating w,hatever cause he 
espoused, and whatever policy he adopted. Even those who 
may have differed from him — as not a few, perhaps, did — 
as to some of his earlier or of his later views of public affairs, 
could never help admiring the earnest enthusiasm of his 
character, and the unflinching courage with which he clung 
to his own deliberate convictions of duty. Nor could any 
one ever doubt that a sincere and ardent love of his country 
and of his fellow-men, of political and of human liberty, was 
the ruling passion of his heart. 

And seldom, certainly, has there been witnessed among us 
a more charming picture of a serene and honored old age than 
that which he has presented during the last few years. 
Patient under the weight of personal infirmities ; hopeful in 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 9 

the face of public dangers and calamities ; full of delightful 
reminiscences of the past, and taking an eager interest in 
whatever might promote the welfare of the present ; grateful 
to God for a long and happy life, and ready to remain or 
depart as it might please Him, — he seemed, so far as human 
judgment might presume to pronounce, to have attained a 
full measure of that wisdom of which it is written, " Length 
of days is in her right hand ; and, in her left, riches and 
honor." 

Not many years ago, he prepared an agricultural Essay, 
which is now on our table. Not many months ago, and when 
he was on the eve of his ninety-second birthday, I met him at 
the Cambridge Observatory, coming to visit the institution 
which had been a special object of his interest and of his 
bounty, and to take a last look, as he said, at the great 
revealer of the stars. Still later, I found him in his own 
library, reading Thucydides, and applying the matchless 
periods of Pericles to the dangers of our dear land, and to the 
heroic deaths of so many of our brave young men. Nothing 
seemed wanting to complete the picture of such an old age 
as was described by the great Roman orator, and exemplified 
by the great Roman censor. Nor would it be easy to find 
a better illustration than his last years afforded of those 
exquisite words in which the great poet of the English lakes 
has translated and expanded one of the most striking passages 
of that consummate essay of Cicero : — 

" Rightly it is said 
That man descends into the vale of years; 
Yet have I thought that we might also speak, 
And not presumptuously, I trust, of age 
As of a final Eminence; though bare 
In aspect and forbidding, yet a point 
On which 'tis not impossible to sit 
In awful sovereignty; a place of power, 
A throne, that may be likened unto his, 
Who, in some placid day of summer, looks 
Down from a mountain-top." 



10 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

It only remains for me, gentlemen, to call yonr attention to 
the resolutions of your Standing Committee, which will be 
rei^orted by the Rev. Dr. Ellis. 

Dr. Ellis, from the Standing Committee, offered the 
following resolutions : — 

Resolved, Xhf^t, in tlie death of Josiah Quincy, — whose name has 
stood on our roll sixty-eight years, and for the last seventeen years 
has led the list of our members, — this Society shares in an especial 
manner in the feelings which have been manifested through our whole 
community. We honored liim for the highest private virtues, and for 
very many services to the public in the long succession and the large 
variety of the offices which he filled, and the trusts which he dis- 
charged. We recognized in him a combination of the noblest prin- 
ciples which we venerate in the fathers of the CommouAvealth, and 
the elder patriots of the land who were also his friends. His lofty 
integrity, his large and wise public spirit, the utility of his enterprises, 
and the practical benefits which are now enjoyed by us as their results, 
will assure to his name and memory enduring honors. 

Resolved, That the President be requested to name one of our asso- 
ciates to prepare the usual Memoir. 

Dr. Ellis then spoke as follows : —7 

The members of this Society, representing all the interests 
and pursuits of our higher social, civil, and literary elements, 
may heartily engage in this sincere tribute to the honored and 
venerated Nestor of our fellowship. He was the object of 
our common regard, and that of no ordinary sort or measure- 
ment. We loved to see him in these halls, if only as a silent 
listener ; feeling that he helped us largely to realize hist'ory, 
and to connect the years that arc gone by their best memories 
and virtues with our own living days. We loved more to 
hear his firm voice, as he stood erect under his burden of 
years, assuring to us an unchanging individual identity. We 
waited upon his always authentic and instructive utterances, 
whether from the stores of a faithful memory, or from those 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 11 

almost printed manuscripts on which he had inscribed the 
terse matter, brief and fuU, which he had to communicate. 
Now that his own lips are closed, and we can no longer hold 
that delightful converse with him in which he made the men 
and the events of the two generations behind us to live with 
all their glow of vitality, we must look to books to tell us 
what was his own place and influence among them. He has 
told many of us his first recollection — a memory that might 
well stamp itself deep and strong — of his looking out from a 
carriage on the British redcoats at their lines on Roxbury Neck, 
a child of three years, when his mother, the widow of his patriot 
father, was among the last allowed to leave this then beleag- 
uered town. He has prepared with his own pen the full auto- 
biographic record of that part of his life which covers his 
political career, with its antagonisms, its sharp party strifes, 
its sympathies and antipathies for the soul of a good and true 
man. His own individuality in forming and holding to a con- 
viction, of which the younger of us are not uninformed, stands 
attested on the records alike of the National and State Legis- 
lature, where he is found in each place voting in a minority of 
one. Let us hope that we shall not have over long to wait for 
the full memorial of him from the most fitting hands and 
the closest confidential trust to which he committed all his 
private papers. We may assure ourselves, that, even when 
those papers deal with what is antiquated to us, it will be 
in a way which will renew in them the fire and the vigor of 
life. 

Besides a largo number of pamphlets, Mr. Quincy has con- 
tributed to our shelves seven substantial volumes of biography 
and history, the subjects of which cover the career of some 
of his own contemporaries, or relate the annals and fortunes of 
institutions in which he himself held conspicuous trusts, and 
for which he did eminent service. 

His long life was led through times and events of moment- 



12 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

ous interest, beginning and ending at revolutionary epochs, 
divided by nearly a century of years. His associates and 
correspondents all through his career were men of eminence, 
of place, and of high personal qualities. He was himself- the 
equal of the best and ablest of them. The qualities of those 
times entered almost into his composition and organization ; 
they wholly controlled and exercised the development of 
his character and the direction of his life ; and, while we share 
this common interest in him and in his career, there is hardly 
a member of this Society but had some special relationship of 
acquaintance or obligation with him, in his own private, pro- 
fessional, socialjor civil range. Mr. Quincy held a succession 
of oflSces which gave him more than a functional headship over 
each of the learned professions, and a magisterial or advisory 
supervision of the various and most heterogeneous practical 
affairs of society. It is for that variety of service, performed 
uniformly with rare fidelity and with consummate ability, leav- 
ing permanent helps and advanced positions for all his 
successors, that we must speak of him with admiration and 
gratitude. 

There is a stage or period in the development of every 
institution and organization, of progressive possibilities and 
capacities, when it needs the quickening or restorative skill 
of a man of practical energy, independent spirit, and firm will. 
One of the most characteristic distinctions of Mr. Quincy was 
his fitness for the successive offices which he filled at the time 
when he entered upon them, and in the condition in which he 
found them. Critical and exciting were the demands and the 
responsibilities attending respectively the Chief Magistracy 
of this city and the Presidency of the College, when he 
assumed those trusts. He found city and college alike in 
transition states, from old methods, limited purposes, restricted 
means, inconveniences and embarrassments, to more expan- 
sive, generous, and comprehensive possibilities, to the attain- 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 13 

ment of which they needed the foresight of a large directing 
mind, and the guidance of an independent and bold spirit. 

This city is deeply indebted to Mr. Quincy for many of those 
admirable elements in its works of utility, its institutions, and 
its present principles of municipal administration, our own 
pride in which finds its full warrant in the encomiums they 
have received from over our whole land and from abroad. 
Its streets, market, schools, and other public edifices, testify 
-that while he was providing wisely, though some thought 
rashly, for what to him was the present, he had in view the 
much larger demands — we all know now how reasonable and 
moderate the provision for them — of a near future. Some- 
times his schemes and plans were devised and pursued by his 
own fertility of faculty, under his own sole advocacy and reso- 
lute persistency of purpose. Sometimes he had the sympathy 
and co-operation of a few strong and Avise supporters against 
sharp opposition from prominent individuals or a popular 
party. I never heard that in this office, or, indeed, in any 
other, he ever gave over any purpose or aim which he had 
proposed ; nor can I recall a case in which any successor of 
his has undone his work. He loved what is good in popular- 
ity, and was utterly indifferent to the other ingredients of it; 
being quite an independent judge as to what constituted those 
respective elements of popularity. Of course, a man of his 
always rigidly upright, often stern, and sometimes severe 
spirit in the works of reform and improvement, especially 
those into which he threw the most of his own earnestness 
and pride as their originator, would be sure to meet many 
opponents. His opponents might also become his personal 
enemies, — a condition, however, contingent on his own feel- 
ing or judgment as to whether he should or should not so 
regard them. The younger portion of us are told of his ardor, 
his impetuosity, his severity of sarcasm and rebuke, in old 
political strifes. We are the rather prepared to believe this, 



14 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

Avlien, besides assuring ourselves, that, in his earlier life, men 
and measures engaged his attention which were likely to 
require just such treatment from a man of his rectitude and 
independence, we call before us his looks and tones as at 
times we have seen and heard him. He was compacted of 
Roman and Puritan virtues, allowing for the two meanings of 
virtue as preceded by either or both those epithets. He was 
able to stand the brunt of all tlie opposition which he 
provoked. He stood so clear of all imputations of sinister 
or selfish purpose, that, when his schemes and enterprises 
were challenged, he could give his whole advocacy to them, 
without any incidental effort for self-defence. He saw 
some stormy days, and was himself the subject of occasional 
hostility. He had to read the Riot Act, and to hear an angry 
mob surging threateningly near his own dwelling. The 
second line of an ode of his favorite Roman poet — Civium 
ardor prava Juhentium — must often have come to his lips, 
though not without generous variations for the word prava. 
But none of those citizens would have disputed to him the 
application of the whole of the first line, Justum ei tenacem 
propositi virum : though they might liave preferred to empha- 
size the Tenax propositi. 

Having, after six years of this city service, declined to be 
a candidate for re-election as Mayor, he was ready for quite 
another sphere in the College, which was also in a condition 
to require wise and energetic oversight. He began there, as 
he began everywhere, by acquainting himself with facts and 
phenomena, faults, needed changes, improvements, and the 
Avay and means for them. He put things to rights. He 
asserted his headship. He renewed, invigorated, expanded, 
enriched every old department of the University, and added 
largely to its scope and resources. He sometimes stood 
between the students and the authorities. He always stood 
over the students, — harsh and imperious occasionally in 



/ 



I 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 15 

word and aspect, faithful and friendly in counsel and feeling. 
They generally found out that the condition for respecting 
him was to understand him, and that the condition for loving 
him was to have no reason for being afraid of him. There are 
men doing noble service in all the professions around us, whose 
charges were borne by his private benevolence, while their 
spirits were cheered by his rallying encouragement. The 
question, I remember, was often discussed, whether he had 
real strong sympathies for young men, — could deal with 
them by wise allowances and gentle tolerances. Some said, 
that having striven with politicians, and presided over boards 
of aldermen and councilmen, and disciplined a fire and a 
police department, he sometimes confused the situation, and 
mistook his measures in his academic sphere. Candor and 
justice will be satisfied with the judgment, that, while there 
might have been reason for raising the question, — which, in 
fact, was one likely to suggest itself, — there was no reason for 
deciding the question in the slightest degree unfavorably to 
the fitness, the grace, or the conspicuous success, of his admin- 
istration of the College. The living alumni of his sixteen 
classes will not fail of bearing some form of testimony to this. 
It was characteristic of him that he should have written the 
History of the College down to his own time. The continua- 
tion of it will have a good start from him. Those beautiful ap- 
pearances of his of late years on its public days have been the 
joy of its alumni, and have drawn glorious tributes to him. 
Nor can one forget, in connection with his life at Cambridge, 
the generous and refined hospitalities of his home, discharged 
with such grace and dignity by that admirable lady who filled 
out the ideal of the old-school refinement and accomplish- 
ment. 

We are sometimes helped to a knowledge of a man's excel- 
lences by observing in him some of those characteristics which 
are called prejudices. One of those convictions held by Mr. 



16 MASSACHUSETTS HISTOEICAL SOCIETY. 

Quincy Avas, that it was an injury to onr young men to travel 
or study in Europe. Many of his pupils can call to mind, that, 
on informing him of their purpose to go abroad, they received 
from him the frank avowal, '' I am sorry for it. The chances 
are that you will be ruined by it. But I hope not." He had 
never been abroad. When he was most free to go, he had no 
desire to do so. He was an American result of modified Eng- 
lish antecedents. A true peer in nature and mien, unable to 
make himself honestly a democrat, he schooled himself to a 
special discipleship of an independent republicanism. He 
thought that he and his country had got all of good that 
England had to give ; and as for the other foreign nationalities 
and their ways, they certainly did not present to him their 
enviable side or qualities. Coming of a Puritan lineage, 
through an ancestral line which had discharged the trusts 
involved in the developing of a wilderness colony onward to 
a self-governed commonwealth, he kept strong hold of the 
firm-set pillars of the fabric. To a thoroughly sincere piety, 
and a most reverential tone of devotion, he joined a spirit of 
independent inquiry and a demand for reasonable convictions 
in matters of religion. No layman could at the time have been 
set over the University who could better than himself have 
softened the shock or the reminder of the change in usage 
and observance from a clerical headship. 

The honors and labors of his life had a felicitous consum- 
mation mingled of dignity and of beauty. It presented one 
of those very rare cases in which providential allotments, 
combined with human conditions and the peculiarities of a 
marked individuality, gathered their finest garland for a crown 
of tranquil and revered old age. This afforded opportunities 
for the mellowing of character, for the turning of all sternness 
into a self-searching of principles, motives, and actions, and 
for the vindication before all critical eyes of the well-tried 
integrity which had never faltered. The last decade of his 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 17 

years was numbered, one by one, by some new token of the 
deepening interest and respect of our whole community. His 
calendar, as it advanced, was announced in the papers. The 
literary and oratorical fruits of his long harvest were credited 
to the verification of his own theory, that the way in which 
an old man should keep his mind from wearing out is to 
keep it hard at work. 

He had hoped that he might live to see the end of this 
fearful civil strife which convulses our land, and which so 
stirred the fire of his noble inborn, high-taught patriotism. 
But, whether or not that should be so, his faith outran his 
hope; and he believed that it could have but one possible 
end, and that a righteous one, leaving us still a nation, but 
chastened and purified. If any one asked him of the cause 
and purpose of the war, he would have been likely to have 
referred his questioner to certain prophetic utterances of 
his own in the Congress of the United States, in January, 
1811. 

A full serenity of scene and feeling attended his release 
from life, by that rarest of all human experiences, a natural 
death, as the ripe fruit falls from the unshaken bough in the 
still air. He was waiting to be called, and Avas just beginning 
to fear delay in the summons. He lived at last for simple 
rest, and musing on the gleanings of thought from liis last 
readings of his favorite moralists and philosophers, Cicero and 
Lord Bacon ; trusting his memory and his spirit for diviner 
nutriment. To the end he read and wrote ; and, because they 
were the last transcript from his pen, he has enhanced the 
sweet and gracious piety of the lines of Addison, which he 
copied as his hand was losing its cunning: — 



" When all thy mercies, my God! 
My rising soul surveys, 
Transported with the view, I'm lost 
In wonder, love, and praise." 



18 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

Djnng in Quincy, receiving funeral honors in Boston, borne 
to his grave through Cambridge, and resting now on the slope 
of Harvard Hill in Mount Auburn, the closing scenes covered 
those of his life's labor and happiness. We may share his 
own strong hope of immortality, and believe that his life is 
rounded by something better than a sleep. 

Mr, Everett, in rising to second the resolutions of Dr. 
Ellis, said, — 

I have been requested, Mr. President, by the Standing 
Committee, to second the resolutions offered by Dr. Ellis ; and 
I do it with the greatest pleasure, although his carefully pre- 
pared, just, and eloquent analysis of President Quincy's cha- 
racter, and your own pertinent, feeling, and most impressive 
address, have left me little to say. An opportunity will per- 
haps be afforded me next week of paying a tribute to his 
memory in another place ; but I must ask your indulgence for 
a few moments at this time, to give utterance to the feelings 
which we all share, and which have been so eloquently 
expressed by the gentlemen who have preceded me. 

You have, Mr. President, justly intimated the reasons for 
which President Quincy's decease should be noticed in the 
most respectful manner within these walls. He became a 
member of our Society in early life, and was considerably our 
senior associate. He took a lively interest in the Society, and 
missed no opportunity of promoting its welfare; attending its 
meetings occasionally down to the last months of his pro- 
tracted life. Besides this, he co-operated with the Society in 
its appropriate labors, enriching the literature of the country 
with a series of historical works of high and recognized value, 
two of them prepared at the instance of the Society. Still 
more, sir, it may be truly said, that he not only wrote history, 
but made it, in the spliere (and that a most diversified and 
elevated sphere) in which he moved ; exhibiting through life 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 19 

those marked qualities, Avhich, by sympathy, infuse moral 
strength into a community, and animate other men to the 
efforts by which individuals and nations obtain an honorable 
place in the annals of mankind. 

I have said, sir, that President Quincy's historical works 
had a high recognized value ; and most certainly, if his vigor- 
ous intellect, methodical studies, his untiring industry, and 
his great facility of labor, had borne no other fruit, the series 
of his historical publications would have given him, though not 
a man of letters by profession, a most respectable place among 
American authors. With the exception of Congressional 
speeches, and occasional essays on the topics of the day, his 
first work of considerable compass was prompted at once by 
filial affection and patriot duty : I mean the Memoir of his 
honored father, one of the most distinguished of those referred 
to by you, sir, who prepared the minds of their countrymen 
for the Revolution. He had the kindness to afford me an 
opportunity of perusing it in manuscript. It was appropriate- 
ly published in 1825, at the close of the first half-century. It 
contained the journals and copies of some of the letters of 
the lamented subject of the Memoir, especially those written 
during his short visit to England in 1774-5, — the last year of 
his life ; and I can truly say, that there is no volume which 
to the present day I read with equal interest for the events 
of that memorable year, as contemplated by an eye-witness 
— and such an eye-witness — in England. He had the ines- 
timable privilege of hearing the two speeches made by Lord 
Chatham, on the 20th January, 1775, declared by h'is son, 
William Pitt, " to be surely the two finest speeches ever 
made, unless by himself." Of these speeches Mr. Quincy 
made a full report from memory, and from a few notes he was 
able to take at the time. It is in some parts evidently a 
more accurate report than that published by Dodsley in 1779, 
after Lord Chatham's death, from notes by Hugh Boyd. 



20 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

Portions of Mr. Quincy's report were published in Gordon's 
letters on the Revolution ; Mr. Quincy's papers having been 
placed in his hands while composing that work. The last 
entry in Mr. Quincy's journal is, '' Had great satisfaction in 
reading my report of the debates in the House of Lords to 
one or two friends who heard them. They thought them 
exceedingly correct, and were amazed at the blunders, omis- 
sions, and misrepresentations of the printed accounts." Presi- 
dent Quincy's Memoir of his father also contains the journal 
of a visit made by him to Charleston, S.C, in 1773, and which 
is of extreme interest. This youthful patriot, as you have 
stated, sir, died on the return voyage from Europe, and within 
sight of the granite cliffs of New England ; young in years 
alone, mature in wisdom, patriotism, and public service. 
When we reflect that he was taken from the country at the 
age of thirty-one, we cannot suppress the thought, that a 
gracious compensation was designed by Providence in pro- 
longing the years of the son to thrice that duration. 

The History of the University is next in order of time, 
as it is the most voluminous and elaborate of President 
Quincy's works. It was suggested by the duty which de- 
volved upon him on the memorable occasion of the second 
centennial anniversary of the institution. It was obviously, 
on the part of the President, a work at once of affection and 
duty. It embodies all those portions of the records of the 
University which throw light on its general history ; on its 
feeble but hopeful beginnings ; its gradual development in the 
succeeding generations and in the last century ; its rapid 
expansion in the present century. It exhibits the noble 
steadiness with which Old Harvard has maintained itself 
through the storms of two centuries, and its re-active influ- 
ence on the public opinion of the country. Especial pains was 
taken by President Quincy to do justice to the characters of 
the distinguished benefactors and patrons of the College, from 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 21 

the ever-memorable Harvard to the present day. These and 
other pertinent and kindred topics are treated in his History 
in appropriate detail, according to their respective interest 
and importance, in a clear and vigorous, and, when the topic 
admitted, eloquent style of idiomatic English ; the whole 
forming a repository, which, next to the original records them- 
selves, will constitute the standard authority for the history 
of the institution, till its prosperous growth, as we may hope, 
' through two more centuries, shall require other volumes and 
other dutiful pens to record its multiplied benefactors, its 
extended usefulness, and ever-growing honors. 

President Quincy's next historical work of considerable 
compass, in the order of publication, was the History of the 
Town and City of Boston. Like the History of the University, 
this work grew out of an anniversary discourse ; viz., that 
which he delivered at the second centennial anniversary of the 
city. Supended during his presidency at Cambridge, its prep- 
aration was resumed immediately upon his resignation of 
that high trust. This History, like that of the College, was 
truly a labor of love. The family of President Quincy had 
been identified with Boston from the foundation. His ances- 
tor came over with John Cotton ; and the position of his 
descendants had been maintained, in honor and influence, 
through all the succeeding generations. His father had taken 
an active part in all the memorable occurrences which had 
turned the eyes of the civilized world on Boston after the pas- 
sage of the Stamp Act : the President himself, born and bred 
in Boston, had represented her in the State Legislature and 
in Congress ; and, in the infancy of the new civic organization, 
he had served her at the head of its municipality for six years. 
Thus was he eminently a Bostonian of the Bostonians. The 
chief part of the work is naturally devoted to an account of 
the writer's administration, and of the series of measures rela- 
tive to its public buildings, its markets, the eleemosynary 



22 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

establishments, the fire-department, the schools, and other 
municipal interests, in which the public spirit, the executive 
ability, and moral courage, displayed by Mayor Quincy, cannot 
fail to awaken at once the admiration and gratitude of the 
citizens of Boston. 

In 1845 appeared the revised edition of Graham's " History 
of the United States." It was published under the superin- 
tendence of a committee of the Historical Society, consisting 
of President QuiiTcy and two or three other respected mem- 
bers. The first volume of this work contained a Memoir of 
James Graham, prepared, in compliance with a resolution 
of the Society, by Mr. Quincy, and embodying all that is per- 
sonally known of a writer who cherished a warm and consist- 
ent affection for this country, and did more than any other 
foreigner to extend the knowledge of it abroad. 

In 1847, and being then at the advanced age of seventy- 
five, Mr. Quincy, at the request of the late Mr. R. G. Shaw, 
prepared for publication the journals of their kinsman, Major 
Samuel Shaw, with a Memoir of his life. This most excellent 
gentleman not only served with great credit through the 
whole Revolutionary War, receiving at its close an emphatic 
testimonial from Washington, but he sailed in the vessel which 
opened the trade to China, as the agent of an association of 
capitalists formed for that purpose ; and was appointed first 
American consul to Canton under the old confederation, and 
afterwards by President Washington. President Quincy's 
Memoir is a highly interesting contribution to the history both 
of the Revolution and of American commerce, a just tribute 
to the memory of a man of sterling merit, and well worthy the 
pen of the distinguished writer. 

The year 1847 was signalized by the death of John 
Quincy Adams at the post of duty, and in the capital of the 
United States. He was the distant relative, the neighbor, 
the contemporary, the confidential friend, of Mr. Quincy; and, 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 23 

at the request of our Society, the duty of paying the last 
tribute of respect to the memory of the illustrious departed 
devolved on him. He readily accepted the trust; and, instead 
of confining himself within the limits of a Memoir of the ordi- 
nary length, he drew up a volume of more than four hundred 
pages, embracing a comprehensive history of the life and ser- 
vices of Mr. Adams. The work did not make its appearance 
till the year 1858, when the venerable author was in his 
eighty-seventli year. I recollect no otlier instance in this 
country of so large a work from a person so far stricken in 
years ; but I perceive in it no abatement of intellectual 
power. In a modest prefatory note, it is stated to be the 
object of the writer to narrate the political life of Mr. Adams 
from his published works, from authentic unpublished ma- 
terials and personal acquaintance, and in this way to make 
him the expositor of his own motives, principles, and charac- 
ter, in the spirit neither of criticism nor eulogy. This diffi- 
cult and delicate task was performed by the venerable author 
with signal success ; and with this the series of his elaborate 
historical efforts closes. I need not say, that, with his other 
occasional literary labors, — several of which, such as the 
History of the Boston Athenteum, which I ought to have 
included in the series, were of a nature to require no little 
time and research in their preparation, — they form what 
would, in almost any case, be considered the life-work of an 
industrious man. But, till his retirement from the presidency 
of Harvard at the age of seventy-three, Mr. Quincy's literary 
labors must have been all prepared in the brief intervals of 
leisure allowed by engrossing official duties and cares. While, 
therefore, they would have given him an enviable reputation 
had he been exclusively or even mainly a man of letters, it 
must be remembered, that, in his case, the writer was over- 
shadowed by the active relations — political, judicial, muni- 
cipal, and academic — in which he stood to his day and 



24 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

generation. On these I need not attempt to dwell : but when 
we consider that Mr. Quincy was for years, and with a brilliant 
reputation both for business and debate, the representative 
of Boston, both in the State Legislature and in Congress, 
an acknowledged leader of the political party to which he 
belonged ; that, as a judge, his term of office, though short, 
was signalized by a most memorable decision, relative to the 
law of libel ; that, as Mayor of Boston for six years, — an office 
assumed under all the difficulties of the transition state to 
which Dr. Ellis has alluded, — his administration was dis- 
tinguished for the most important improvements and reforms ; 
and lastly, that, with great acceptance and public favor, he 
presided over the oldest literary institution in the country, 
bringing to the arduous and responsible station a variety of 
qualifications, administrative and literary, intellectual and 
moral, rarely if ever combined in one man, and most certainly 
never surpassed ; and that, having in an advanced but vigor- 
ous age become emeritus in this long and honorable career, 
instead of indulging in the repose conceded to the decline of 
life, he continued for twenty years, by word and deed, to per- 
form all the duties of an active patriot, vigilant for the public 
weal, jealous for the public honor, and full of courage and confi- 
dence in the darkest hours of the present tremendous struggle ; 
adding, finally, to all his other titles of respect and honor, the 
authority which length of years, attended with virtue and 
wisdom, can alone confer, — we must all feel, we do all feel, as 
we gather round the grave of President Quincy, that we have 

lost our FIRST CITIZEN. 

Mr. Everett was followed by the Hon. Richard H. 
Dana, Jun., who spoke as follows: — 

Mr, President, — I have received from the Standing Com- 
mittee a request to say a few words on this occasion, — a 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 25 

privilege which I suppose I owe rather to a family friendship 
with the honored deceased than certainly to any personal 
claims. It is hardly for me to speak of one, who had lived 
nearly his half-century before I was born, in the presence of 
so many who knew him so much longer and more intimately 
than I can claim to have done, though he honored me beyond 
my deserts. Before such an assembly as this, sir, I shall 
attempt no more than to notice one characteristic of Mr. 
Quincy ; and, as to that, rather to speak of the effect he 
always produced upon me, than to offer an opinion or analysis 
of his mental constitution. 

Mr. Quincy was a nobleman. He filled out our ideal of what 
the nobleman should be where nobles or conscript fathers 
rule in society and in the State. He had the merits, and he 
partook somewhat of the defects, of that character. He was 
favored by nature with the front, the station, the voice, the 
manner, that should belong to the nobleman: and, still more, 
he had in his soul the true temper of nobility. His was 
a lofty, high-toned character, — some perhaps would say, a 
proud and rather high-strung temper. Honored members 
have just told us, and told us Avith eloquence, and fulness 
of detail, of his fidelity to all duties, his integrity, and his 
laboriousness. It is for me only to tread this narrow path, 
beset with delicacies, and to recall to myself and you the 
high-spirited, chivalrous gentleman. Thackeray says that 
the " grand manner " has gone out. It had not gone out 
Avith us while Mr. Quincy lived. A boy at school, when 
he came to Cambridge, I met a man in the street, who, I felt 
sure from his style, must be Mr. Quincy, and raised my hat to 
him, and received a most gracious bow in return. It was 
he ; and he could be recognized anywhere by any one on the 
look-out for a high character among the highest. 

A good deal has been said to-day, and well said, of 
the spirit of liberty that inspired his father, and rested 

4 



26 MASSACFIUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

on the son. I do not doubt or mean to disparage devotion to 
the liberties of all human beings; but there was in the men 
of that day a love of independence, that was no small element 
among the causes of our Revolution. Remember, brethren, 
that we were provincials, — governed by a class of crowned, 
coroneted, and mitred men living in another hemisphere, in 
whose privileges and dignities we could have no part. I can 
conceive of men with little or no aversion to such dignities 
in their own State, and with little confidence in political 
equality, rising in indignant resistance to such a subordina- 
tion as that. It was that proud devotion to independence 
that Burke said united the holders of slaves in a common 
cause with the free North. After our independence was 
secured, when the conflict raged over half the world, between 
the radical philosophy of the French revolutionists and the 
conservative philosophy of Burke and England, the sym- 
pathies of many, of most, of our highest patriots in New 
England, were with the latter. 

Mr. Quincy told me, not long before his death, that he had 
the means of proving, from the private letters and journals 
of the patriots who formed our Constitution and set it in 
motion, that their chief apprehension for its permanency was 
from what they feared would prove to be the incompatibility 
between the two classes of men, the two systems of society 
they would represent, who must control its policy and pa- 
tronage. They feared an antagonism in a republic of equals, 
— between what was substantially an oligarchy, founded on 
slavery, and the free, mixed classes of the North. It was the 
more dangerous, because it was sectional and absolutely 
restricted. There was a sectional class, an aristocracy, or 
whatever else you may call it, with which the people of the 
Northern States could take no part, excluded by their moral 
convictions and by geographical laws. That this slavery, 
which met their intellectual disapproval and their moral 



JOSIAH QUmCY. 27 

aversion, was a matter of State control and responsibility, was 
not enough. They feared that it would generate an aristo- 
cratic spirit, which would tell on the national life and national 
politics. They saw that it tended to foster an arrogating 
political class. They knew that oligarchal classes, with their 
interests, maxims, and sympathies, had often governed the 
world. They feared that the antagonism, the incompati- 
bility, between these classes and interests, would lead to a 
separation ; the weaker section, whichever that might prove 
to be, striking for its independence, — a separation made the 
easier by the fact, that the sj^stems were separated by a geo- 
graphical line. When I told him that I did not remember 
this in the published writings of that day, his answer was, 
that they earnestly desired a union for our strength and preser- 
vation, and kept out of public discussion the tender points ; 
but that I would find it in their letters and journals. 

I allude to these subjects, Mr. President and brethren, I 
beseech you to believe, in an assembly of gentlemen of all 
shades of opinion, only because they explain the political 
course of Mr. Quincy ; at least, in my opinion, throw some 
light upon it. 

It was Mr. Quincy's belief, — I do not wish to say here, on 
this occasion, and before you, whether it was a true or an 
unsound opinion; take it either way, — it was his opinion, 
that such an antagonism, such a growing incompatibility, 
existed from the first, and culminated gradually to the end. 
It was his belief, that the struggle between the Federal and 
Democratic parties was, to no small degree, a struggle be- 
tween these interests. True, the lines were not so drawn. 
Most of the questions and the issues framed Avere purely 
political ; but he believed the overthrow of the Federal 
party, and the installation of the Virginia dynasty, was a suc- 
cess to the slaveholding class, since which the education and 
property of New England have never had their share in the 



28 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

government, unless in exceptional cases, and sometimes upon 
what may be called special terms. 

Mr. Quincy thought that the contest of 1820, on the admis- 
sion of Missouri, was substantially a contest between these 
classes and interests, and ended, as before, in a substantial 
success of the sectional, oligarchal system. Such, too, he 
believed to be, and with similar results, the struggle of 1850, 
on the admission of California; and such the final struggle 
of 1860, the first practical defeat of that class. 

Now, sir, Mr. Quincy, so believing, so feeling, to the 
depth of his being, was not of a temper to acquiesce in 
that subordination. His independent spirit was enforced by 
the moral aversion he had for the system on which that 
dominant class founded its power. He could not bow to it. 
No: he feared, in the critical winter of 1860-Gl, but one 
result. That was not peaceable dissolution ; it was not Avar. 
He feared only some compromise by which the slaveholding 
class, with its maxims and interests, should gain a permanent, 
social, and political ascendency over the free, mixed classes 
of the North. That was the one result he could not bear. 
Against that he would have been willing to rebel. Rather 
than that, he would have seen the Union, much as he loved 
and valued it, rent in twain, or severed into as many parts 
as it might please God to divide it. 

You will remember, sir, that I am not presenting the 
highest view of Mr. Quincy's character. I know he loved 
the largest liberty. He not only advocated, — that is cheap, 
— he labored for, the greatest good of the greatest number. 
He saw in the present struggle far more and greater things 
tlian the political emancipation of the North from the control 
of a sectional dynasty. 

Mr. Quincy loved public life, public duties, and public 
station. It is the more to his credit, that he never bowed, 
never swerved, — nay, was never suspected of bowing or 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 29 

swerving, — to mere popular opinion. He paid little respect to 
mere numbers on a question of right and wrong. His creed 
admitted no such blasphemy as that the voice of the majority 
is the voice of God. Perhaps, indeed, his gallant spirit took 
a little secret, unacknowledged satisfaction in being in a 
brave minority. To no one may both parts of Lord Mans- 
field's celebrated declaration be better applied than to him : 
'' I love popularity ; but it is that popularity which follows, 
not that which is run after." 

I do not know, Mr. President, what may be the custom of 
this Society on occasions like the present. I do not know 
whether you ever present to yourselves here the reverse of 
any picture of a deceased brother, — whether you ever exam- 
ine here the weaving of the tapestry behind, by which the 
best effects are produced. But as I am, and have always 
been, an unfeigned admirer, devotee, of the heroic qualities 
of Mr. Quincy, perhaps I can the better touch upon what may 
be brought forward elsewhere, and what may have been con- 
sidered in his lifetime, as defects. 

I do not know what is the definition of bigotry. We ordi- 
narily associate it with inquisitions and tortures ; but I sup- 
pose it means only an undue confidence in and devotion to 
our opinions, and is consistent with entire kindness, and 
desire to do justice. In that scientific sense, if any one who 
has differed from Mr. Quincy, and has felt the shock of his 
collision, the congressus Achilli, should complain that he was 
severe, and even bigoted, I should say, that the manliest 
course was to admit, that, in that sense, there might be some 
ground for the charge, and to set it down as one of the 
infirmities of a great character, — one of those terms upon 
which alone, in our imperfect condition here, we can obtain 
such a fellowship and example. The denomination known 
among us as the Orthodox Congregationalist have objected 
that his " History of Harvard University " has not done them 



30 MASSACHUSETTS HISTOEICAL SOCIETY. 

and their colleges justice in their relations to Harvard. I have 
never read either side, and have no opinion on the question ; 
but I have been told by good judges, partial to Mr. Quincy 
and his side, that the complaint is not without foundation. 
Such was his affection for Harvard and its supporters, such 
his convictions in its favor, that he did not see readily the 
qualifications and objections. Was it not so, too, in political 
contests ? I am inclined to think we must admit that it 
sometimes was. But, having been thus frank and candid, I 
claim the right, in return, to remind you what these imper- 
fections were, and from what they sprung. They sprung 
from no ill nature, no indifference to the rights or feelings of 
others, but from the depth and heartiness of his convictions. 

Burke would not see — he could not see — Charles James 
Fox, though on his death-bed, much as he loved him. Why? 
Burke was so convinced that the French political philosophy, 
to which Fox had lent the aid of his great influence, was 
dangerous to social morals, and the very existence of any 
respectable body politic, that he could not dissever the man 
from the opinion. It is easy to say, that we must separate 
ourselves and others from our and their opinions. Perhaps 
superhuman beings would do so. If opinions are mere in- 
tellectual tenets, or if they are the cards with which we play 
the game of life, it were easy. Those men will find no diffi- 
culty in doing that, with whom opinions on vital questions of 
our relations to God and man, and the welfare of all here and 
hereafter, are no more than opinions on natural science or 
geographical statistics. If men are conscious, that, in them- 
selves, there is no connection between their souls, their 
characters, their entire natures, and their opinions, it is inex- 
cusable in them not to make the distinction in dealing with 
other men who differ from them. But, with Mr. Quincy, 
opinions on vital questions were convictions. They took 
deep root in his nature. They were inseparable from all he 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 31 

valued or feared in himself, and all he respected or distrusted 
in others. They might turn out to be right or wrong ; hut 
they were drawn from the past, and bore upon the highest 
duties of mankind in the present, and the destinies of man- 
kind in the future. They might be right or wrong at last ; 
but to him they were truths, and he treated them accord- 
ingly. To his final convictions on vital questions, he was 
ready to sacrifice all, — even life. How could he treat them 
lightly? With such a character, on such questions, we need 
not fear to meet complaints from those who have encountered 
him front to front, — that he was severe, or even bigoted. 
We have little sympathy with those complaints when they 
come from men who met his scorn or rebuke for civil coward- 
ice, or dereliction of duty. 

It has been said that he was not a wise political leader. 
He certainly showed wise forecast in his own affairs, and in 
those of the city and university. In politics, he saw clearly 
into general principles ; and, in many respects, divined remote 
consequences. Still, I confess, I should not like to promise 
myself or my party unreservedly to his guidance on the 
policies of the day and hour. Perhaps the combination of 
qualities in his nature, not easy to analyze, made him far- 
sighted, and not good at near sight. Perhaps his tempera- 
ment did not admit of his dealing with men and measures as 
the policy of political management requires. 

If I have erred in noticing these qualifications or defici- 
encies in his constitution, it is a great gratification to believe 
that in them I have noticed all the objections that have ever 
been made against him. What brighter eulogy could I pass 
upon Mr. Quincy than to say, that after a life spent in the 
severest conflicts of municipal, academical, state, and national 
life, in which he had much ungracious work to do, no charge 
has ever been made against him? I honestly say, I never 
heard of any, affecting in any way his private or public 



o'i MASSACHUSETTS HTSTOEICAL SOCIETY. 

character, which I have not touched upon to-day, and before 
you, his friends. 

I would not underrate or gloss over, still less try to ren- 
der attractive, imperfections, however usually attending- lofty 
natures. But, if we regard the common opinion of mankind, 
they are not those that the ordinary New-England character 
most needs to be guarded against. The philosophy of Benja- 
min Franklin has done too much towards lowering the tone 
of the youth — I should rather say, of the partially educated 
youth — of New England. Franklin deserved, sir, the statue 
you helped to raise to him, and the eloquent oration with 
which you inaugurated it ; for he did great things for science, 
and rendered great services to his country in her struggle 
for independence. He brought to the aid of his country 
sagacity, energy, and patience, and shed much honor on our 
infant name. But take from Benjamin Franklin what he did 
for science and the independence of his country, and try him 
alone upon his philosophy, and maxims for life, and I would 
rather, a thousand times rather, that any one in whose veins 
ran my blood, that any — all the youth of New England — 
should look to the example of Josiah Quincy than to that of 
Benjamin Franklin. 

Mr. President, among all the true and gratifying commen- 
dations that have been and will be passed upon Mr. Quincy, 
I trust w^e shall not overlook nor keep in the background, 
bat always put foremost, those qualities Avhich made him the 
heroic, lofty gentleman. 

The resolutions were then unanimously adopted. 



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